"Unless a tree has borne blossoms in spring, you will vainly look for fruit on it in autumn."
- Walter Scott
What in you longs to blossom now? Even though many of us choose to set goals and make resolutions in January, that timing contradicts nature – both human nature and mother nature . . .
As Nature herself knows, attempting new growth in the dead of winter makes for a very short life span! Perhaps explaining the reality of so many new year’s resolutions never taking hold?!
Trees and flowers know better to wait for warmth to blossom. And so we as human have this same blossoming opportunity now – when the air is cool and the sun is warm and we feel hope deep inside our limbs!
So, regardless of what did or didn’t happen with your new year’s resolutions, what longs to blossom in you now? Can you sense more vibrant health inside you? Do you know greater abundance in your business? Are you feeling excited about new love blossoming? Is a new project waiting to blossom? New collaborations? Deeper friendships? New fun and adventure? Spiritual awakening? Travel to new places?
Let’s use this wonderful, fresh, spring energy to give voice and commitment to what longs to blossom from deep within us . . . looking forward to a wonderful autumn harvest because we’re taking the time now to tend the inspiration of new growth . . .
Feel free to post your spring blossoming urges in the comments section . . .
I highly recommend using this review and planning tool, created in part by Paul Schadler, MD. This is the ninth year I’ve used it, and it helps me keep my focus on all that is most meaningful to me. Give yourself several hours over two or three days to work with it. Give yourself the gift of being very present, without rushing through it.
The Best of 2009Go wild! Acknowledge all your goodness and greatness.
One guideline: no criticism, only positives.
- What did I accomplish that I am most proud of?
- What experiences touched me the most? Were the most intimate?
- When did I have the most fun?
- What experiences were the most powerful?
- Most sacred?
- What difficult challenges did I meet successfully?
- In meeting the challenges, what did I do best?
- What lessons did I learn?
- Describe my power in those situations.
Creating 2010
Think big! Be bold! Have fun!
- What dominant intention do I have for 2010?
- For my mind/body/spirit?
- My relationships?
- My home environment?
- My work/service?
- My finances?
- My growth/development?
- My fun, adventure, expression?
- In which areas of my life do I plan to move forward in 2010?
- What challenges do I intend to overcome?
- What specific goals do I intend to achieve in 2010?
- Who do I want to be? What do I choose to live/express more?
For each of us, there is a life that is uniquely and simply ours. A life that comes from our specific soul: from our strengths, values and passions.
Yet, like a fish who doesn’t recognize how special and important water is for him, we humans often have blind spots about our own natural greatness.
Someone compliments you on how empathic you were with the clerk at the grocery and you don’t quite understand. Doesn’t everyone notice what’s going on with others? No, we sure don’t! Then you tell a friend how great it is that he always seems to know the most efficient way to organize a project and he doesn’t know what’s the big deal!
If you feel you are living anything less than the life that is totally, joyfully yours, take some time over the next few days to notice your specific strengths, values and passions. What do you love to do? What comes naturally to you?
Ask a few friends or colleagues what they notice you doing naturally or with enthusiasm. What do people often turn to you for? Advice? In what area? Help with fixing something? What? Getting something started? What?
Just by focusing on this for a few days, you will be living a life that is more fully, uniquely yours!
I’d love to hear what kinds of things you discover about yourself and your best life . . .
Every day for the past several days, I have been noticing anything I feel scared or anxious about and transforming it. Working with the simple yet powerful concept that I already have everything I need inside me, I notice what’s causing the fear or anxiety and then find a way to know it from the inside rather than expect it from the outside.
I’d love to share a bit of my process so that you can use this transformation tool, too.
For example, in my business, I got scared and anxious when I felt enough money wasn’t coming in. So, I asked myself: why do I want the money? What do I believe the money will give me? I want the money to pay my bills. I believe the money will give me security. Okay, how can I feel, how can I be security right now?
I don’t have to wait long for the intuitive answer to come to my conscious awareness. Spending a few minutes laying on the ground, under a tree, being with the sky though the leaves of that tree helps me instantly feel plugged into All That Is and I feel secure. Wow. Easy. Doable. Highly effective. Sure beats the alternative of panicking!
An example from my personal life: I felt sad and scared when it seemed that a friend was “abandoning” me in a moment in favor of another friend. Okay, why do I want my friend to “choose me?” What do I believe me being chosen will give me? I want to be chosen to demonstrate I’m valuable. When I’m chosen, I feel important. I feel I matter to that person. Okay, how can I feel valuable, important and that I matter right now?
A couple of answers come to mind. I have taken the time to put the focus on me and what’s going on with me. I am valuing myself, prioritizing myself and indicating to myself that I matter to me! And, I have many friends. If I would like to spend time with a friend, I can value that experience for me and reach out to another friend. Wow. I know I matter and I feel valuable and important.
My whole life becomes better in two ways when I transform these “yucky” feelings. First, I get to feel and be what I desire – secure and valuable, no matter what’s going on or what others around me do or don’t do. Secondly, I am now in the energy of “security” and “valuable,” so I naturally attract more experiences of security and valuable, including more money flowing in and more friends who treat me like I am important to them!
I am so jazzed about this transformation process right now, I am considering teaching a 3-week, 1-hour each week tele-class for $89.
I would love your input.
What about this tele-class might interest you? If you took it, what would you most love to take away from it at the end of the 3 weeks?
Please take a moment to comment and give me the thoughts off the top of your head. Thanks in advance!
As I am integrating all that I learned from both speaking and exhibiting at the Career Management Alliance annual conference last week, I am struck by how well I did both jobs at essentially the same time.
I'm more introverted than extroverted and incapable of multi-tasking. So, I actually had no idea how I would do both jobs well, back-to-back for two days.
I do love to be at the front of the room. My presentation was short, just 45 minutes. I looked forward to speaking, but thought I wanted to spend the rest of my day alone in my room or take a self-guided walking tour.
Yet, I had to be at my booth the day before and the rest of the day after my presentation, talking to folks about my coaching services and coaching courses.
Thank goodness I usually sooner or later remember to practice what I preach! I set an intention to show up fully with each person in front of me by being present, connected and playful. I even practiced with my seat mates on the airplane on the way to the conference.
I had so darn much fun, thoroughly enjoyed all the people I met, rocked the house with my talk and went out to dinner on the second night with 11 of my new best friends.
Not a bad two-days work for an introverted single-tasker!
I just got back from the Career Management Alliance annual conference in San Antonio where I gave a presentation: Strong You, Strong Biz: YOU Are Your Most Powerful Business Attractor. I feel humbled and grateful.
Back in the fall when I agreed to this engagement, I felt excited. Excited to connect with my people – other self-employed coaches, in their cases, specifically career coaches. Excited to embark on a new adventure with my new business partner at the time – she would man the expo booth and I would give the talk and we’d both have a great time doing it.
Fast forward a few months to the day when I learn that the majority of the conference attendees aren’t self-employed and are in fact in the military helping military folks transition to civilian life and jobs. And to the day when my new business partner can suddenly no longer be my business partner for several personal reasons.
Then I start dreading the conference. What do I know to help these military folks? How am I suppose to do it all myself? The conference organizer reassures me that plenty self-employed coaches will come to my talk. I don’t have to re-structure it for the military. My sister offers me some tips on giving my talk and man-ing the booth myself.
Yet, I still have a bad attitude.
Just a few days before the conference, I wake up and realize, just like I wrote on a plaque I gave my grandma when I was 15, that “we are what we make ourselves.” In good coach-like style, I remake myself.
I embody my talk. I can feel in my bones how good it is. As I prepare all the expo materials, I feel grateful for the opportunity to serve in this way. I see the entire trip flowing smoothly, from the moment the shuttle drives picks me up from my front porch to the time another one drops me back on my porch two and a half days later. I set an intention to have a good time, give all I am there to give and connect with wonderful people. I set an income goal for all the new business that will come from this event.
And guess what happened!
It went exactly like my intention, only one better. Many people from the military came to my talk, too. And they got huge value, slightly different value than the self-employed folks, but great value, just the same. Two military ladies even told me I was “under-selling” myself to just offer my services to self-employed professionals, because they saw how I can help them, too. So we are going to talk . . . I see that income goal being met and then some!
And, the shuttle driver on the way home even dropped me off at my house first!
Today is day 21 of my 21-day commitment to focusing on strengthening my spiritual foundation and sharing my process with you.
The time has flown by.
And, at the same time, I feel like I've always been in this process of strengthening my spiritual foundation. What that tells me: yes, I would love this to be a natural, daily part of my life!
For the last couple of days, I've gotten back to a practice that I used daily years ago. The original idea sprung from Julia Cameron's morning pages and I adapted the process to make it my own.
Each morning before I started my day, I would write long-hand two or three pages of whatever came to mind. I started with writing all the ideas in my head that weren't serving me. I got them out of my head and onto the paper.
Then, somewhere in about the middle of the writing, ideas would spring to mind. Ideas for how to best do my day that day and ideas for projects down the road.
Basically, I cleared the junk out of my head and then the good stuff had some space in which to flow. And, I loved having a record of the great ideas. I then transfered them from those pages to wherever they best fit in my planner and I got rid of the pages.
All that remained were ideas that could serve. And, often by the end of the day one or more of those fresh ideas had already been implemented. How cool is that?
While listening to Michael Beckwith this morning, the concept of choosing my reality soaked into my bones a bit more. He said something like, "Circumstances don't create our reality, our attitude does."
This may be the thousandth or ten thousandth time I have heard or read this or some variation of it. Yet, today I got it that I want to choose my attitude even when it's more challenging for me.
I almost always have a fantastic attitude with my work - except if something technological malfunctions, or even hiccups. Then I am sure my world as I know it is coming to an end. I almost always have a superb attitude in my personal life - until my sister or my sweetheart says or does something I don't like, or worse, something I judge.
So, what if I took the opportunity with a technology hiccup to breathe, know that all is well and take a short walk? What if I focused on the opportunity to learn about that technology or the opportunity to connect with the techno genius helping me? What if I focused on the opportunity to love even when I don't like? What if I examined my judgment of another to see what is crying out for love in me?
What if I consistently and consciously make the choice for freedom, rather than bondage to situations that don't seem to be going "my way?"
Twenty-five years ago, when I read Victor Frankl's book, Man's Search for Meaning, I first came to understand the importance of choosing our focus and thoughts. If he kept himself alive in a Nazi concentration camp by focusing on hope for the future, surely I can hold a positive mental attitude when my email goes down for a few hours.
I'm now challenging myself to override my initial, knee-jerk reaction to consciously choose a positive mental attitude every time I start to fight something/someone.
Ah, that may keep me busy for awhile . . .
